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So here is the first part of my Project 365 Retrospective: The Best of Caturday.

Part of me felt a little like I was ‘cheating’ by posting cat pictures each Saturday, and maybe I was at first, but then I tried to take it as a challenge to get more creative with my snaps of my furry little girls. And of course, some weeks I featured cats other than Zelda and Mrs.Parker. Ultimately it doesn’t matter; even if it was cheating, it was still fun and I wouldn’t have had it any other way.

It’s hard to believe this is my last post of 2013’s Project 365. I was planning a post with the ‘Best of…’ slide show, but I then I decided against it. I’d rather just post a final picture with little fanfare and give myself a few days to reflect on the Project, choose my favorites of the year for the slide show, and finish any withdrawal symptoms I may suffer.

For now, I leave you with one last new image. Or in this case, a different version of an image I’ve already posted. Here’s the set up:

Do we remember that I had two cameras with me at the Vanderbilt Mansion?

In the background above, you can see part of the scene I shot with the C330:

I also took a shot with the Konstruktor:

So now we have three views of those trees and the house on the river: first in digital taken with a cell phone, second in medium format taken with a massive 50-year-old TLR, and finally in 35mm taken with a novelty do-it-yourself plastic toy camera.

At the start of this project, I never would have thought I’d be making such a comparison, but there it is. Modern, then Dinosaur, then somewhere in between. How apropos!

These are some of the ideas I have to chew on over the next few days. How has this project changed my photography? Where has it led me? What have I learned, not only technically but philosophically?

While I’m chewing and digesting, I will also be wishing all of you a most wonderful start to the new year. I appreciate the company on this journey of mine, and hope you stick around to see where we go in 2014.

Today Buzz and I drove upstate to walk around the grounds of the Vanderbilt mansion in Hyde Park. Of course I was going to bring my new Mamiya C330, but I was also trying to finish rolls of film that I had loaded in other cameras, so I brought along a friend for the Mamiya.

Aren’t they cute together?

The Mamiya and the Konstruktor are both black and have waist-level viewfinders, but beyond that point, the similarities come to a screeching halt: A few ounces of plastic vs a few pounds of metal and glass; a toy that could barely harm a fly vs a camera that could effectively be used as a weapon against assailants; novelty imperfection vs a legendary quality.

I’ve been drooling over these bad boys for a while now. Changeable lenses, bellows, and waist-level finder all wrapped up in a beautiful and beastly package that could easily serve as a weapon were anyone to attack me while I was out shooting? Oh yes. Want. And now, have!

There’s only five days left of my Project 365 and you can be sure that one of those pictures will be something out of the C330. Stay tuned!